Microfluidic systems have been gaining increasing interest for use in chemical and biochemical analysis and synthesis. Miniaturization of a variety of laboratory analyses provides myriad benefits, including providing substantial savings in time of analysis, cost of analysis, and space requirements for the equipment which performs this analysis. Another touted advantage of microfluidic systems is their suggested adaptability as automated systems, thereby providing additional savings associated with the costs of the human factor of performing analyses, e.g., labor costs, costs associated with operator error, and generalized costs associated with the imperfection of human operations, generally.
A number of different microfluidic technologies have been proposed for realizing the potential of these systems. For example, microfluidic systems have been proposed that are based upon microscale channels or conduits through which fluid is transported by internal or external pressure sources, e.g., pressure pumps, and wherein fluid direction, e.g., as between two potential fluid paths, is carried out using microfabricated mechanical valve structures. Other unrealized technologies have proposed utilizing acoustic energy, or electrohydrodynamic pumping of fluids to effect fluid movement. However, due to fundamental problems with these technologies, e.g., excessive costs or inoperability, they have largely floundered in the research institutions where they were originally conceived.
Electrokinetic material transport systems have shown the ability to fulfill the promise of microfluidics by providing an accurate, automatable, easily manufacturable system for manipulating fluids within microscale systems. Despite the advances of electrokinetic flow systems, it would generally be desirable to provide more and more complex systems for performing a wide variety of different fluidic operations, integrating multiple operations in a single microfluidic system, as well as provide systems capable of performing massively parallel experimentation. In order to provide such systems, it would generally be desirable to provide such systems with advanced abilities to monitor and control the relevant parameters of any and all fluidic elements within a given system, including variables such as temperature, time of reaction, length of separations, and the like. The present invention provides methods and systems that meet these and other needs by providing an operator with greater ability to monitor and control microfluidic systems.